As more and more people are vaccinated in wealthy countries, there have been growing calls for the intellectual property and patent rights around the COVID-19 vaccines to be waived.
Proponents of waiving the rights believe it could speed up the end of the pandemic globally, by allowing more countries and more factories - particularly those in the developing world - to produce vaccines locally.
The campaign received a boost after the Biden administration recently backed a waiver - a move senior Irish ministers have hailed as a positive and significant development.
However, pharmaceutical companies and several other countries have continued to oppose such a move - claiming it will stifle innovation.
The topic was debated on The Hard Shoulder.
Rosamond Bennett, CEO of Christian Aid Ireland said the vaccine knowledge must be shared with the world.
She said: "If you’re only one in 500 who is being vaccinated in a developing country compared to one in four in a wealthy country… then you need to make sure these pharmaceutical companies share their technology and their know-how.
“It has already happened in one instance: AstraZeneca asked the Serum Institute in India to produce the majority [of their vaccine there]... it can be done.
“The Associated Press found there are factories already on three continents that are ready now, and could produce vaccines. We’re not talking about building a factory from scratch."
She said pharmaceutical companies should continue to invest in developing new drugs - but suggested they're also there to provide medicines that help people.
She said: “The long-term implications of [not waiving the rights] would be millions more deaths. Can we live with that?
“These vaccines exist… we’re talking about sharing the knowledge.
“It’s very easy for us to sit in this country and know we’re getting our vaccine, thinking it’s OK for other people in developing countries to just wait.”
She also said the pharmaceutical companies have managed to produce COVID-19 vaccines so quickly because they've received tens of billions of euro in public funding during the pandemic.
'Not a workable idea'
Deirdre Clune, Fine Gael MEP, believes waiving the rights is not the way forward.
She suggested the patent has “nothing to do" with the vaccine technology, how you produce it, or how you source the raw materials.
She believes the companies behind the jabs should certainly share their technology, but it takes "know-how, years of experience and excellence in production" for factories to produce vaccines.
The Fine Gael politician believes the pharmaceutical firms should partner with others internationally to ensure vaccines are produced on a global scale.
Ms Clune said: “I’m not saying ‘no, no, no’ [to a waiver]... but it’s not the solution we think it will be.
“Some of these vaccine companies are sharing their know-how… they’re partnering with other pharmaceutical manufacturers. That’s fine. The patent is a different kettle of fish.
“We’ve got to be careful long-term of what the implications of this are.”
The MEP argued that companies must have a motivation to continue to invest in and develop new medicines - saying mRNA vaccine technology had been in development for a "long, long time".
However, she did say she wants to see countries such as the US end bans on the export of vaccines and vaccine ingredients.
